Strip merchandisers are widely used throughout the retail trade to take advantage of cross-selling opportunities between products and to create impulse purchases without using valuable shelf space. They are also useful to display a plurality of discrete articles in a prominent manner using the least amount of available display area.
Examples of such strip merchandisers are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,483,502 & 4,546,943.
As can be seen in the art, strip merchandisers are provided with a plurality of longitudinally spaced hooks upon which product may be hung. Many items are sold in packaging having a convenient tab in which a suitable hole or slot can be made enabling the products to be readily displayed on a strip merchandiser. Unfortunately this is not always possible or convenient, either the packaging size or shape does not easily take a punched hole or slot, as in cosmetics sachets for example, or the product does not usually have any additional packaging, as in a paperback book. It is possible to attach tabs having slots therein to each item. Tabs of this type are described in many Patent publications including WO00/26109; U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,542,634; 5,020,761; and U.S. Pat. No. 4,890,809 but these can have their own disadvantages. The adhesive on the tab may not always attach or remain attached to the product. For example the package may be a sachet which has been sealed by heat sealing or the like so that the edges of the sachet are no longer flat and do not readily adhere to the tab. In other cases, the adhesive may damage the product, for example the cover of a book. It will also be apparent to one skilled in the art that these tabs invariably are applied manually and the expense through added labour and material costs is not attractive. The current requirement from many retailers is for products to be delivered by the manufactures/wholesalers already attached to a strip merchandiser. If product is damage or detached from a strip then there is every chance that the whole strip or event the batch may be rejected.
It is one object of the present invention to provide a display device akin to a strip merchandiser whereby the disadvantages described above may be overcome.